Thomas County cat. [volume] (Colby, Kan.) 1885-1891, 1887-10-20
THE CONSTITUTION.



Dfmcultics Encountered By the Framsf
Of tho Incompatible Document.
The constitution of the United State
is so bli.f and so simple that some o
our readers may very naturally won
der why it should have been so Difficult
to make. The convention which
formed it, numbering at first fifty-eigh
members, sat from the close of May t.
the 18th of September, 1877. An able
body of statesmen has perhaps nevel
assembled, and they labored with in
tense and anxious concentration o
effort for nearly four months. Yet thu
result of their exertions was a dOcu
ment of short and easy paragraph!
that could be printed in two or three
of these columns, and slowly read in
less than an hour. But consider the
knotty questions involved In each Of
those quiet. simple little sentences
The first section of the first article set
tied one of the most perplexing OF
them all, by ordaining that Congress
should consist of two houses. Now, the
Inconvenience of having two legisla-
tive bodies were about as well-knOwn
to the members of the convention rs
they can be to us.
Those Inconvenience are great and
numerous. The convention had to
consider the obstructive and extreme
ly conservative character of the Brit
ish House of Lords. They had also to
weigh the probable consequences OF
confiding all the law-making power to
a single house. Here was great ques-
ton, not yet finally settled. perhaps.
The short paragraph which settled it
in the United States for a century, con-
tails the result of countless hours Of
study, reflection and discussion.
Then, again, there was the question,
so important to Rhode Island, New
Jersey and Delaware: How shall the
smaller States be protected against the
power and wealth of the
larger? In the Continental Congress
they had voted by States. system
which had made Delaware's vote of
equal weight with that of Virginia; a
felt by the larger States to
be unjust, unwise and not to be en-
dured. On this rock the convention
nearly went to pieces, and it was only
after some weeks of most anxious, and
we may truly say agonizing, discus
sion, that the convention reached the
of having the States equally
in the Senate, but repre-
tented according to population in the
House.
A fearfully difficult matter to arrange
grew out of slavery. No one was will
ing TO have the odious word slaue, or
any gifts derivatives. in the constitu-
ton of a country claiming to be, and
to be, the freest under the
sun. But the slaves existed; there
were supposed to be million of them.
They were an element of power, and
in some of the Southern States they
were too important not to be consid-
cred in the conditions of union.
South Carolina, with her slaves
out. would have been so in
significant member of the Union, that
she never could have willingly Joined
It with that prOviso. On the other
hand. how could the free states con-
cede to the slave States an added
weight in the Union proportional to
The number of their slaves, and this
without so much as using the offensive
and homogeneous word? At the same
lime. the Northern States, where
slaves were fcw-for there was hardly
, State IN which there were not some
compensated by adding
10 the word Representatives" the
words land direct taxes" The South
was TO have its slaves counted in max
ing up the representation in each
State. but it must also pay for them.
This was the hardest problem the
had to solve. and they solved
it in the way which. upon the whole.
was best for the time. We need not
shrink from the avOwal that this de-
vice of Article l, Section 2. which
allowed the Southern States to count
five slaves as three white PEOPLE in
the appointment of representatives and
direct taxes. was the least compromis-
ing compromise that was possible
then. The dreadful word, however.
was not employed. The slaves came
in at the end of an enumeration as,
'fhrce .fJths Of all other persons''-a
dainty de:ice worthy of DIR. Franklin.
.Iouh's Companion.